States Of Mind
by FluffleNeCharka
Summary: Three months after the end of the movie, Loki is in a mental hospital on Earth. Without memories of his past, is there any hope for his future? Will anyone realize his supernatural nature? And where is Thor in all this?
1. Broken

**Author's Note:** This fanfic is basically inspired by my brother's urging and one viewing of the Thor movie. Wait! Don't hit the back button yet! I swear I'm working on this as seriously and thoroughly as any other fanfic. Please give it a chance. It's somewhat of a cliched premise, but it could work. Please give it a rad through before passing judgment, but by the same token please don't be afraid to be honest with your opinions. Thanks for reading.

* * *

He was curled up again.

It wasn't unusual, with this patient, but it was frustrating. Every time he thought they'd made progress, nightmares and daydreams would chase it all away. Dr. Zlotan sighed and approached gingerly. Although most of his violent tendencies had subsided in the past month, this particular patient had a dangerous cocktail of issues. It was entirely possible that he could lash out at any moment. Possible - but not likely. He didn't have a problem so long as it wasn't a blonde treating him, and he knew and recognized Zlotan even through his delusions now.

His issues with open spaces had been something his doctors had put a lot of work into. Still, whenever the medication proved not to be enough, they could always find him either in the bathroom or the closet. It was the closet, this time. The lights were off. Brightly lit, open spaces reminded him of things he couldn't work through; he was likely to have a panic attack if pushed, or worse, just completely shut down. Zlotan didn't turn on the lights, kneeling down by the closet door with an annoyed frown shot to the guards. There were some patients he was afraid of, but Loki wasn't one of them.

"We've talked about this," he began gently, in a voice that could've coaxed a rabbit out of its hole. "When you have problems, you send for me. I can't help you if you won't talk to me."

"I know." His knees were pressed to his chest, his arms locked tightly around them. "I just didn't want to disappoint you like I disappointed them. I never wanted to disappoint anyone."

He sighed, reaching out to place a hand on the other man's shoulder in an attempt to snap him back to reality. It wasn't uncommon for Loki to completely lose himself to a sea of incoherent thoughts when he was like this. Zlotan didn't know how to make this stop, but damn it if he wouldn't try his best.

"You can't disappoint me," he said earnestly, quietly. "Your progress may slow, but it's being made. It's alright, Loki."

Loki didn't seem to hear him. "I just wanted to make everyone proud. Help people. I thought I was so smart. I thought it would work."

"Loki, you're babbling again. Slow it down for me." He watched his patient's eyes flicker in and out of focus. "Tell me what you're thinking."

"I made so many mistakes. So many. I shouldn't have tried. Shouldn't have even been born. Shouldn't have ruined everything." He was beginning to rock in place, a little. "You know this. I've told you this so many times, I don't know why we're going over it again-"

"So that you might remember something new, something that might help me help you," his doctor answered instantly, voice calm and gentle. "It's like putting a puzzle together. I need more of the pieces. Let me help you."

"I... I can't see any of it. I just remember... I think I heard a voice, someone telling me no. And then I fell. Jumped, maybe. Is that new?"

"Yes. You've never told me that before." The redhead smiled warmly at him, though he was unsure Loki even saw it in this state of mind. "This is good. Keep going."

"I was trying to explain to him and he didn't understand. No one's ever understood. My mind goes so fast - you call them racing thoughts but I never knew there was a name for it, no one did. He didn't understand. I knew then he never would. No one ever would. I made so many mistakes. So many. It was never going to be okay again. Never. So I fell." Loki wasn't looking at the room around him as he said it. His voice grew quieter, and wavered. "I don't want to remember this. I want it to all go away."

Was that yet another indicator of suicidal thoughts? It wouldn't be the first time in these past four months that the self-named patient had tried to end it all. The first two weeks had been nothing but stony silence and crushing depression. He'd snapped at the first blonde doctor to come near him, nearly jumped out a window in an attempt to escape another, refused to eat and expressed no interest in talking to anyone. Zlotan had spent countless hours easing him into the art of conversation. He didn't even try to pretend that meant he'd fixed this poor man's life.

"What are you feeling right now? Talk to me."

Loki blinked, looking him over as if seeing him for the first time. "I'm just tired. I'm tired, and I'm tired of being tired. I don't want to do this anymore. Can't you give me something to help me sleep?" His tone was pleading.

"It would help your body more if you did that naturally. I can't hand you a drug for your every problem, you know that." He held out his hand. "Come on, get out of here and I'll order you some dinner, and things will look better in the morning."

Loki accepted his hand, his face blank. His life was in enough ruins that crying or fighting didn't help anymore. Zlotan had hoped that meant he was accepting that he needed help and beginning to move forward, but clearly they hadn't been making as much progress as he'd thought. It had at first been unclear how much of his life this particular patient remembered. Moments like this made two things clear: he neither knew anything nor wanted to. He hated his memories, those vague whispers and voices he couldn't shake. He wanted it to all go away. Zlotan's one job in life was to make it all come back. That should've prevented them from being anything but enemies, but Zlotan also knew how to bring him back to reality and keep his depression from swallowing him up.

Some people dealt with trauma by crying, or screaming, or anger. A lesser used option was to completely shut down and not focus on anything. To keep him from having another panic attack, his psychiatrist had told him to focus on his breathing. It was also handy to help slow his thoughts. His pulse, the hum of the lights, the faint sounds of Zlotan's footsteps and the ambient noise around him - it was all a way to slowly block out his own thoughts. That wasn't the way he was supposed to use it. He knew that, but it didn't stop him from doing it. Zlotan's frown said he clearly knew what his patient was pulling, and disapproved thoroughly.

Still, this was relatively painless as far as patients went. He counted the day as a success as he told one of the guards to run down to the cafeteria and get dinner. He could've asked a nurse, except that Loki always found it amusing when the guards were forced to do menial tasks. Zlotan was not above manipulating people to keep his patients spirits up. Actually, there had been a lot of manipulation involved in his career. He liked to think of it as creative disinformation for the greater good.

In the end all he really managed to do was get the man to curl up at a slightly different location. A more realistic person might've despaired at the lack of progress. Then again, no one would ever accuse Gaberiel Zlotan of realism. He informed the nurse station that Loki was allowed one dosage of Xanax should he request it, and went home late, determined to figure out how this nugget of information fit into the bigger picture of the puzzle he'd been handed. He was going to figure this out, no matter what it took.

Loki, for his part, prayed he wouldn't dream and was rewarded with one he didn't remember. But no matter what his psychiatrist said, things didn't look any better in the morning.

They never did.


	2. Pieces

**Author's Note:** Thank you to all of my reviewers! I can't believe how quickly people responded. I'm really flattered that people like this enough to put it on watch, let alone fave. I know it may be a little bit slow moving at first, but I'm trying the best I can to keep this fic from just being angst without plot... though Loki is kind of an angsty person, which isn't surprising given what happened to him. Anyway, as always critiques and criticism is welcome and appreciated, as are reviews. Thor and SHIELD get involved next chapter! I know we're taking a while to get to that, but it helps to build things up a little, I think.

* * *

Loki's every action was controlled - or as controlled as they could be, given the situation.

That was how he was with other people, anyway. With Zlotan present he felt free to slouch and bury his face in his hands like a normal person. He instantly relaxed when the redhead entered a room, and today was no exception. But that was a reaction he'd trained into himself, a learned behavior reaffirmed through consistancy. There was no doubt Loki was still tense. He was just a more managable degree of it. He had a feeling he hadn't been a very candid person even before this.

Zlotan sunk into his own chair, opening up the notebook on his desk. He had one for each of his patients, and while he'd had Loki as a patient for longer than most of the others, his was a notebook was only half full. He couldn't remember much. He didn't want to. The way he acted, it was clear his memories were painful to him. And if he hadn't displayed such deeply suicidal intentions, if he hadn't been overwhelmingly depressed and detached, Zlotan would have let him ignore his past and move on. But it was clear that the only way to put his life back together was to get him to remember it and deal with it. As painful as it was, it had to be done. It was like surgery or resetting a bone. The problem with that analogy was that in this case, they weren't sure what bone they needed to reset.

All he could remember was his own first name. For a month that and the constant belief he shouldn't be alive was all that he had. Coaxing him out of his shell was a delicate process. He had profound self worth issues that kept him from forming any kind of a friendship with the other patients. The only person who he bonded with was his psychiatrist, who had the necessary patience and stability to keep up with Loki's erratic behavior. And if there was one word for it, that was it - erratic. Chaotic. Inconsistant. Something that was fine one day would set him off the next. He was fortunate to have found someone unshakable and used to this kind of thing.

Loki surprised him by reaching out and touching his shoulder. Their eyes met. The patient frowned. "You've been staring at that for five minutes."

"I'm thinking. It's more or less my job." He smiled briefly, in that disarming way he had. "How're you holding up?"

The dark haired man leaned back in his chair. "I don't really know. I think I'm alright for now. I wish I wasn't couped up in here."

"It's for your own good. You know that. I couldn't take it if something bad happened because I let you go too soon." His gray eyes were sincere. "Every patient a doctor loses is like a knife in their hert. But I've been trying to get you more outside time, for what it's worth. I'm doing all I can."

"I know." He shut his eyes. "You're the only person left who cares. I know that. I don't understand why you bother or why no one ever came for me, but I know your reasons for all this. I just wish it was all over. I want out."

"I'll get you out one day. I promise."

He opened his green eyes and looked at the floor. "Last night, I think I remembered something from before my arrival here. I can't be certain... but I think it was my father I was talking to. Before I jumped. But I'm not sure." He swallowed visibly. "But it doesn't matter, because clearly he doesn't care, since he's not here. He would've come if he cared." His hands were shaking, so he clenched them together. "Since none of my family ever came, they clearly have disavowed me, in mind if not in legality."

His doctor wrote something down, looking thoughtful. Loki studied his heart shaped face and long fingers, familiar features by now. Nurses and guards changed. Zlotan was permanent. He wasn't like the other doctors he'd encountered here; he cared. He was taking copious notes and devoting countless hours to someone. For what? What could Loki ever offer him? He had no wealth, no resources, nothing to give in return for this. There were times - paranoid episodes, Zlotan called it - when he was convinced there was some ulterior motive, something he wanted from him. There had to be more to this than he was seeing. But then inevitably he was proven wrong. There was nothing to be gained from this.

He was useless, in other words. Zlotan would've lectured him on self worth if he'd said it. That didn't mean it wasn't true, only that the redheaded man didn't want to hear it.

Loki _knew_, the way other people knew the sun would rise and the sky was blue, that he was a terrible person. He couldn't remember why. It didn't matter. The same way no one needed to ask why the sky was blue, he unquestioningly obeyed the feelings inside of him. He knew he was bad. Terrible. He was not a good person. It wouldn't surprise him to learn he'd been a criminal before he ended up here. Why else would he be haunted by such constant guilt, nightmares of being hunted down by people in armor, and the neverending fear people were watching him? Surely he'd been involved in something terrible.

Another he knew was that he was a liar. He knew he was the same way he knew his name or the length of an hour. So predominant was this idea that hat had been the gist of his first three conversations with Zlotan. _"I'm not lying,"_ he'd said over and over again. To which Zlotan replied, over and over, unfailingly dedicated and calm, _"I know you're not. I believe you, Loki."_ There was still rarely a day he didn't add a disclaimer to his speech.

And why shouldn't he? He lied to the nurses, on the endless paperwork they'd given him, in order to try to get himself ahead. In order to make himself look better. He wanted to be seen as sane and whole. The problem was that he did nt have perfect self control. Far from it. When he was lucid, he was a good enough liar, but at any moment his control could crumble out from under him like faulty ground and he would be blabbing to anyone who listened. His thoughts poured out without his consent or awareness as he slipped in and out of consciousness. It was in that place inbetween his mind and the real world that he had somehow come to more of an awareness of what had happened, though the full truth eluded him.

The problem was that these nuggets of knowledge slipped away like water cupped in his hands. There was no choice, if he wanted to make progress, but to tell Zlotan everything. His internal war between the part of him that wanted to forget and the part desperate for answers kept him from being honest even now, even with this man. Such was the depths he was drowning in. He was beginning to accept that there was no way out but through this man, through his expert guidance and patience. He thought his guilt meant he was bad; Zlotan said it could mean other things, because the redhead always saw the hidden meanings in everything. Difficult as it was to bring himself to trust someone completely, it had to be done.

He would die otherwise, spiritually and physically.

Zlotan's familiar voice brought him back to the present. "That's not true. We couldn't match your fingerprints or DNA to any records. If we'd called them and they'd refused, you'd be right, but we have no reason to believe they're even aware of what happened. Other than, perhaps, your father - and one family member doesn't indicate a whole group's opinion. Don't jump to any conclusions, Loki. What else do you remember?"

"That's it. At this rate maybe your grandson will cure me." His voice held an audible note of disgust to it. "I don't know why I bothered mentioning it."

He really didn't. Thinking about the past made his skin crawl and his stomach churn. He didn't want to even attempt talking about this. The only way to keep in check the urge to go invisible was to remember that it seemed to terrify everyone in the building. Zlotan was already afraid Loki was going to kill himself. It wasn't right to torment him with inexplicable disappearances. If it got out that he was capable of that, he might be labelled a mutant and locked up somewhere a lot less welcoming and caring than this.

The one consolation to the disgusting revelation that he was a mutant was that most of their criminals were well known. Someone would've come for him before now if he was a terrorist or some major criminal. Whatever he'd done, he could take solace in the fact that he wasn't part of a cult or split off militia. Not that he was going to flaunt himself as an example of mutant goodness to the world any time soon. He hadn't even wanted Zlotan to know.

"Earth to Loki." Zlotan smiled as Loki blinked up at him. "Don't be so negative. This is good. Anything worth doing takes time. Brighten up."

Loki sighed, looking remarkably bored and haughty for a man in his position. "Your optimism is obnoxious."

"It's a gift." He shrugged, scribbling something down. "You'll thank me later." Switching gears, he added, "I can see improvement in your lucidity already. I think we're going to stick to this anti-depressant."

"I don't have depression."

"We're not going through that bullshit argument again. I'm in no mood for that. Besides, an anti-depressant doesn't strictly have to only keep you from being depressed. It can also balance out your extreme moods or act an anti-anxiety medication. Everything has its uses."

"Even me?" Loki asked bitterly, a note of challenge in his voice.

To his credit, the doctor did not hesitate to respond. "Yes."

"Well, then, what is it?" he demanded tiredly.

Zlotan shrugged. "I don't know. I said everything had a purpose, not that all purposes were readily visible. But I know you were found by the right person and transferred to this facility for a reason. I know I was meant to help people. Just because I don't see the reason for something right away doesn't mean I won't later. Or that I need to know why. The important thing is that this happened and now we're dealing with it, one day at a time."

"I do not wish to hear anything else about taking this one day at a day. I want this to be over and done with."

"Believe me, nothing would make me happier than an instant fix for my patients. If that existed, however, we'd be doing it already. My advice to you is to consider the hypnotherapist I suggested and to just take it a day at a time." It took him several tries, but he got Loki to look him in the eyes. "If you weren't capable of recovering, the universe would've let you die."

Loki said nothing. That was his default response these days, his defense against people. What only his psychiatrist realized was that sometimes, it wasn't a defense.

Sometimes, Loki just had nothing left in him to say.


	3. Storms

**Author's Note:** Thank you to all my reviewers! The amount of support I've gotten is really surprising and inspirational. I'm very sorry about the delay in updating. Thank you for your readership and your continued support. I'm surprised by the number of people from foreign conuntries interested in my dinky little stories. I'm very flattered by this and I hope this chapter is okay. It was extremely difficult to write.

* * *

Loki's mind was whirling.

He stared at Thor with eyes the color of peridot gems, his face a mixture of horror and enchantment. Behind Thor stood Zlotan, disapproving, angry, afraid of what this man barging in might do to his patient. But Loki didn't see Zlotan. He saw only Thor - whose name was supplied to him by his subconscious, who he was sure he knew. He had seen this face in his dreams. He had heard this voice in his head. Belief beyond reason, sources he did't know how to identify told him, _this man is Thor_ and that was all it took to root him to the spot. There was something inexplicably horrifying and comforting about Thor's presence. He was familiar. He was forien. He represented fear, comfort, family, anger, a whirlwind of things. Loki couldn't think. He couldn't beathe.

There was no indication Loki understood what Thor was saying or even heard it. He stared at him, like a deer in headlights, trying to fight against the wave of unreasonable and overwhelming panic that was rising up in him. He wanted to run. Scream. Fight. But he didn't know why. He didn't even know how to think. The world was a thousand miles away and yet all too real. His mind could not process what it was seeing, nor could it block this out. He swayed where he stood. This couldn't be happening. This was just another one of those dreams he'd wake up from in a minute. His green eyes flickered with a spark of magic for a moment, as if his own energy was trying to muster up a defense for him. He didn't appear to notice.

Thor reached out and touched him on the shoulder. "My brother?"

Loki shoved him off with surprising strength and dexterity, and then he was gone. He'd meant to run down the hall, but found himself teleported outside the building. Farther, he needed to get farther away. He couldn't be here. His heartbeat was in his head and there were so many voices, so many things running together, he was suffocating, he had to get away. He flickered in and out around the grounds, unable to think or breathe, clutching at his raven hair, caught in the maelstrom of his own mind. He neither heard the footsteps approaching him nor saw the man approach.

"Loki!"

There were hands on his shoulders, but they weren't Thor's. They weren't big and rough. These were long fingered, thin, pale where Thor's was tanned. Loki shut his eyes and inhaled. Cigarettes, oranges, suede. The same voice that could unleash Hell upon him told him _this man you can trust _and so he clutched him in a death grip. Then the next thing he knew they were somewhere else entirely, some place quiet and surrounded by trees, where no one could find them.

But the real world faded away all too soon, replaced by more images and sounds. Faces, whispers, words, anger, gold, rainbows, metal, armor, clanging, heavy fotsteps, thunder, the crunch of ice, where was he? Someone was shaking him but they were far away, through a deep fog. He swayed and collapsed without even being aware of it. Thor. _Thor_. Brother. Metal armor, an overturned table, yelling, yelling, familiar, he knew him. How he did was lost to him. Everything was lost to him as he drowned in his own mind, crushed under the magnitude of a thousand different thoughts at once.

He babbled. In Norse, in English, about the way he kept seeing the phantom image of people and the voices shouting lines without context in his head. He shook. His open eyes saw nothing. He kicked and thrashed, threw the man off him again and again until finally he regained his senses... for very certain definitions of sense. He could see the world. He could stand. He could even walk. What he couldn't do was think, because it would unleash more tidal waves. All he wanted to do was collapse. Loki didn't want to even be awake. He wanted everything to stop.

His magic flared up one last time, a burst of ice that left the ground coated in front. And then he stopped talking. He stopped moving. He just existed, in a state beyond incoherency. He didn't even blink. Something inside him had changed, and not for the better.

Zlotan was left with the task of, having been teleported off the hospital grounds, guiding Loki back to the closest thing he had to home.

* * *

Zlotan was not afraid of Thor.

Gaberiel Nikolaj Zlotan, age forty five, an untrained, unarmed mortal man, was currently scowling up at the god of thunder with barely contained fury. He had been in enough crisis situations that he'd built up an immunity to intimidation. In his life time he'd swapped continents, been shot in the leg, and dealt with a homicidal patient who'd gotten ahold of a knife. Thor was nothing. Zlotan crossed his arms and drew himself up to full height - a less than impressive five foot five - and glared at him like he was an unruly child. Many patient's families had recieved that look, a combination of disappointment, protective anger and disdain. His cold gray eyes were alight with anger. Thor was surprised by the tenacity of this doctor, but then Zlotan opened his mouth and cemented himself as a very brave (or possibly stupid and reckless) human being.

"You are an idiot. A completely reckless, immature, impatient idiot. Did you ever consider what this would do to him? Did you think about maybe asking the person who's been with him _every day_ since this happened what would be best? Ever stop to think maybe the doctors who have spent their lives working in this field might know better than someone from a world where psychology is unknown? _Did you think at __**all**__ today?_"

Thor had the decency to look thoroughly ashamed of himself. The redheaded doctor had piercing eyes when he was angry and his body language made it clear he was not in the mood for excuses. "I meant no harm-"

Zlotan's accent grew more pronounced as he continued to rant right over Thor's attempted apology. "Well, that didn't keep you from doing it. Outstanding. I have half a mind to have him transferred out and not tell you where he's going." He rubbed the bridge of his nose, shaking his head slightly. "The only reason I'm not doing that as we speak is because it would be detrimental to his mental health. My patients are worth more than their weight in gold to me. If you ever want to talk to Loki again, you will go through me, because my purpose in life is protecting and healing these people. You will do things the right way or you won't do it at all. Understood?"

"Yes, good doctor. I... I have clearly erred my brother, in more than one way. How is he?"

He inhaled slowly to calm down. _He means well. Reel it in._ In a more or less neutral tone, he said, "Drugged up to Hell and back. Apparently he managed to squirrel awake some Xanax for just such an occassion. Where he hid it, I'm not sure, but the first thing he did when I got him off me was go knock himself unconscious." He ran a hand through his silver streaked hair and sighed. "Now, I'm going to try to put my anger aside for a moment to explain something to you as best I can: your brother is not okay. His condition has improved since he arrived, but his moods are all over the place, his memories are gone, his powers are dormant and when they do manifest they're unstable - in essence, my only good news for you is that he's alive. He's not in the state of mind right now where you can just stroll up to him and act like nothing's happened."

The massive man frowned. "What has caused this madness in him?"

"My guess is that you'd know more about that than I would. If we're going to help him, I need to know everything. Your childhoods, your family, the last events before we found him here on Earth. I need complete honesty or - and I cannot stress this enough - I can't ever hope to turn his life around."

"...I would not know where to begin. We are immortals and far more ancient than can be easily conveyed." Thor met the doctor's eyes. "But ask and I will say it."

"Then come to my office. I have a few calls to make, one of those being to SHIELD so they can help me with the magical aspect of this, and then you and I are going to have a talk. But you can start by telling me how you knew he was here when we couldn't find you to tell you before."

"Heimdall found him."

Barley resisting the urge to facepalm, Zlotan inhaled and exhaled slowly. "Oh, I can tell this is going to be a fun conversation already."

* * *

Having Loki materialize into his living room that night wasn't scary so much as it was startling. Zlotan nearly dropped his cup, hot cocoa sloshing out onto the carpet. Loki frowned.

"Sorry. The nurses and I were having disagreements." Loki sank into Zlotan's armchair gratefully, ignoring the look his psychiatrist was giving him. "I don't even know how I'm doing this. I don't know where you live. Or didn't, rather." He looked around, trying not to show his instability, his growing fear of his own abilities. "I just wanted to get away and then..." he raised his hands up in a gesture of helpless cluelessness. "Not that the nurses will believe me."

"We'll sort that out later, when they ask. SHIELD will probably be able to back you up on this. But I'm more concerned about your mental state than your magical one. How're you holding up?" Zlotan asked gently, setting the cocoa down on the table. "Can I get you anything?"

"I'll live, I suppose," Loki said, burrowing his head in his hands. "I need a favor, Zlotan... Gaberiel."

"That's what I'm here for. Shoot."

"SHIELD wants to assign me a new psychiatrist. New doctors. New everything. They want control of me." The green eyed god frowned. "I know I need to be kept where my powers can't cause casualties, but I can't accept strangers digging into my head."

"I don't have a whole lot of authority to decide whether or not I can stay your psychiatrist. But I'll try my best to convince them that a switch is a bad idea." He chose his next words carefully. "However, if a switch would help you more than I could... I wouldn't be against it. I want you to get well again."

There was no humor or light in Loki's eyes as he replied, "I was never well, doctor. And I doubt I ever will be."

And with that parting statement, he vanished.


	4. Ignoble

**Author's Note:** I swear I haven't abandoned this. I'm just sort of trying to figure out how to pace it. On the upside, there is at least a solid concept of what the ending is going to be now in my head, which means I at least know what I'm working towards. I also dug out my old Psychology textbook so I can try not to suck quite so much in writing that aspect of this, which I really should've done earlier. And there's some very poorly veiled, badly done foreshadowing in here because I guess I'm in love with ccertain cliches. But still, I consider this to be progress in writing what I have to say is one of the hardest-to-write fics I have ever done.

As always, reviews, thoughts and suggestions welcome.

* * *

"Doctor Gaberiel Nikolaj Zlotan, born Gavran Nikolaj Zlotanovich, Belgrade, Serbia. Blood type O negative. Worked on a few mutants before, went to college in the USA..." Fury frowned. "He's completely average. Can him. I want the best on this project."

"My brother needs this man's help!" Thor objected. "He understands the madness plauging him like no other healer does! You can not simply hand him over to a stranger!"

"It would _really_ suck if the Serbian government thought SHIELD was discriminating against their people," Tony Stark added in casually, thumbing over the other man's profile. "He seems pretty clear headed for someone who grew up in a war zone. There isn't _really_ a reason to throw him off the project. Especially since he found Loki fair and square."

"Are you threatening me, Stark?"

"I'm theorizing, Fury. You wanted my tactical advice. That's what I'm officially signed on for, right? To advise the Avengers and the people involved with them." He smiled benignly, eyes like a shark. _I got this_, his expression said to Thor. "Between this and SHIELD being pro-Kosovoan indepedence, you could lose all your power in the region if, say, it were to leak out to the mass media via some sort of internet leak and spun ever so slightly. Romania's already on terrible terms with you, you really want to add Serbia to the list?"

Fury glowered. Thor looked confused. Tony tilted his head challengingly. If he weren't Iron Man, he wouldn't get to be so blatantly manipulative. If he weren't rich, even that wouldn't have let him get away with this sort of conversational arm-twisting. But his father had spent a lifetime using people and escaping consequences, and Tony was nothing if not his father's copy.

"Alright. Anyone else you want on this, Stark?"

"No, I'm good. Thor, thoughts?" he asked in that infuriatingly calm Tony Stark way. Thor smiled weakly at him, grateful for his unusual mortal friend.

"Nay. I merely want my brother restored to the man I once knew."

* * *

As a direct consequence of his devotion to his work, desperate efforts to avoid idle time and a need to be helpful or useful in some manner, Zlotan had never been married.

He had no children, no pets and about three real friends all things told. His house was cluttered and rarely clean. His freezer contained a lot of microwave ready meals, his cupboards were stocked with ramen and soup, and he hadn't made his bed in weeks, half the time crashing on his couch, spending about ten percent of his income on caffeine to keep himself going. He arrived home tired and late every night, got up early every morning and endured the nicknames 'Doctor Suck Up', 'Boy Scout' and 'Goody Two Shoes' from his coworkers, eye rolling for being the idealist in a field of broken cynics and the rare but delightful ethnic slurs from the less enlightened in his field.

And he didn't bullshit himself: his desperately optimistic, overly devoted personality was not healthy. It was the result of a lot of rejection and some very deep seated abandonment and guilt issues he really needed to seek more help for. He had never been loved or needed, so he put himself in a career field where he would be both of those things automatically then overdid it trying to save overtly hopeless cases. It was honestly kind of sick, the way he he'd set himself up to be in a position of power over needy people. Zlotan didn't pretend he was noble. He was human, ultimately, subject to all the issues that came with being a modern person. He was flawed and weak and ultimately dependant upon the people around him more than he would like. He was just one person, in the end.

So was Loki.

He might have been a god, but in essence he was just a person. A soul. Emotions, hopes, failures, problems and strengths. He wasn't any different to his therapist now than he had been when he came in. He was still a patient, a person and a friend. He was Loki, the same spiteful patient who put a Xanax pill in his nurse's coffee to make it sour. The same arrogant person who thought he could outwit the psych evaluation sheets. Though the history he'd gotten from Thor was excessively dramatic and complicated, it was no more disturbing than anyone else's profile. Actually, it was a lot _less _disturbing than some people's profiles. Zlotan still had nightmares about some of the cases he'd worked. The main difference was that now he was undoing centuries of family problems instead of a simple decade or two. In that aspect, he was performing without a safety net; there was much, much more baggage that needed to be sorted through than with any other patient. There was a very real possibility that Loki might be yet another person too far gone to save that Zlotan was working at anyway out of the aforementioned caretaker-nurturer complex.

Walking through the SHIELD Psychiatric Center, a tangled mess of containment cells and downtrodden people with super powers, it was possible, if difficult, to have hope for the future. Loki was a lot more sane and lucid than most of these people were. At least he knew his surroundings most of the time. These lapses out of conscious awareness were rarer and rarer and might have stopped entirely if Thor hadn't barged in like an idiot the other day. Loki trailed after him, looking apathetic and semi-omposed.. Of course he did. He never wanted anyone to see him fall apart, but the way his eyes lingered on things was telling to his therapist. He had very small signals that he gave off, little flexes of the fingers and side glances that gave him away. His green eyes were a touch unsteady. But he wasn't teleporting away and hadn't vanished. Staying to fight the fight was the first major step for someone with supernatural powers.

"We'll get through this," Zlotan told him, despite the fact that he knew Loki was unlikely to hear him in this current state of mind. "Or we will die trying."

Fateful words, it turns out.

* * *

Loki burns.

The ice is excrutiating fire. It burns until it freezes and chills him into screaming. There is no voice to his scream. There is silence, and darkness, choking, flailing. Even though it was what he wanted, the pain was such that it began to make him fight against it anyway. He wanted everything to stop. And miraculously, it does. Did. Past and present blur and there was ground underneath him.

And every time he closed his eyes on Earth, it felt like he was tilting again on that vast empty plane of existance. His throat hurts for days. The people around him (_mere mortals human Midgaradians Americans?_) tend to him with fluids and IVs and medicine, and the burning inside goes away. His fever falls. He lives again, the bruises of impact having faded, the scars from his fall all but vanquished. Except he keeps falling inside. He is suffocating. He is fine.

It's a familiar feeling. He has a feeling it's always been this tightly controlled of a whirlwind. But he is too weak to keep a grip on it. His eyes flicker and glow and things go wrong. Equipment malfunctions. Doors open. Things vanish. He gets names mixed up and words come in a mix of Norse and English, and he feels without thinking. Guilt. Hatred. Disgust. He flinches at the sight of himself in the mirror. It burns him to know he is still alive.

He is well acquainted with the art of biting back on his anger. It's the helplessness he doesn't know what to do with. He doesn't know how to ask for help. He does not feel it would come if he did. Trapped in a world of flickering half remembered shadows and voices only he can hear, it is an eternity befor he begins to make the slow return to functioning sanity with the help of a particularly stubborn stranger. _(Redheaded mortal foreign doctor healer not-god_ his thoughts crash together when Zlotan tries to explain himself the first time.)

There is talking. Lots of talking. Days and nights blur together in both a lack of need to sleep and a need to escape the waking world. He dreams of snow, ice, people with blue skin, the color gold, ominous blonde figures approaching, and slowly, painfully, relays the coherent bits of information to the mortal tasked with piecing him back together.

Then Thor reappeared. Loki felt the world tilt under him again. Everything they'd put together shattered and reformed, everything was too much and not again and none of it was real it was all a dream and - one whirlwind later he found himself being transported to a new facility, too tired to even protest, feeling familiar pangs of icy self hatred, fear and doubts twist in his chest until he was docile as a kitten. The god of mischief has fallen. Now a mortal man tends him, teaches him like a Midgardian child. It would be unbearable, if he had any dignity left. His silvertongue and flexible mind are gone. In their place is a heaviness.

He knows not how long his self induced sleep lasted, only that he woke up in a room done in grays and blues, and Zlotan's voice somewhere off in the background. The clock reads three thirty, though that tells him nothing, and there are no windows. His clothes have been changed, probably in an attempt to take all drugs from him.

_All I take with me is grieving..._

He follows the half-murmured song to its redheaded source, where Zlotan is pouring over a stack of books on Norse mythology, his MP3 player idly on shuffle.

_Close your eyes and leave me, save your words, don't cry..._

It's not in English, but gods speak all tongues by default. It's one of those powers he has automatically, like teleporting, with no control or ability to turn on or off. Loki leans against the doorframe and watches him. Studies the lines in his face. Sees the tired circles under Midgardian eyes. And he wonders if there is anyone back there (_gold and golden hair and warm laughter and so many people, always watching and whispering, mocking him, not good enough_) that is working for him like this. _(Stone faced man telling him no, refusing him, abandoning him for the better child, the one who really was his child and Loki is the child of no one, really.) _He wonders what Zlotan, or anyone for that matter, would choose a profession based on being with the broken people in the world. He does not understand what he has ever done to deserve help. He does not understand why, now that he knows Loki is the evil lesser son of Odin, he would choose to not only stay but devote himself further to him. Loki does not comprehend that any being, mortal or immortal, could ever care for someone like him.

_All I take with me is grieving, and isn't that love, anyway? Say goodbye and leave me..._

He slips back towards his own room, and feels the pain inside him lessen somewhat at the thought that at least one soul would mourn his death. The people in the wisps of memories in his mind (_brother father but not really, not after what he did, angry voices and betrayal, what have I done, I did it for you, why don't you understand) _have uncertainty written all over them. He can't trust his own mind and he certainly can't trust people he can't even remember. The only person he has that he can remotely count on is a complete stranger, a mortal do gooder with a saving-people-thing and terrible taste in music. This is how low the god of mischief has fallen. It is a pitiful excuse to stay in SHIELD captivity or in mortal company, but he is not the sneering brilliant arrogant prince and god he once was. The man that would have tried to exploit the people who cared about him is gone. He died in that icy vortex, and what remains of him is trapped here on Earth, thawing, learning the arts of sincere living and redemption at a painfully slow pace.

He is dying and he is becoming alive again. And these things are not at all contradictory now.


End file.
